You Can Never Quarantine the Past

Apparently my hammer is a "Professional" one, at least a sticker on the side of it says so...so that would make me a professional hammer user then, right? I discovered this a few days ago when, with hammer in hand, Brent & I set out to ravage a few local fire eaten houses to take away any scrap trims and mouldings laying about but every house we were counting on had been razed! So sad! But, this experience led me on a wild goose chase in search of old pieces of wood, mostly needed to frame out a series of paintings Brent has been working on for a long while in between animating and touring and all of that other stuff we do!

A friend sent me to ebay-the-great which then sent me to Scranton Pennsylvania which then led me to York, PA the home of an amazing salvage yard called Refindings. Not only is this place a giant depot filled to the brim with old doors and windows and bathtubs and antiques of all kinds (ranging from unopened Thanksgiving decorations from the 70s [a 3d crepe paper turkey! Yes please!] to lamps to telegraph pieces) it is all used or discarded materials making it an environmental haven!

I always feel weird helping to produce art, making another thing in a world of things, but when pieces of the new things are repurposing pieces of old I definitely feel a little better about it for sure! Here are a few pictures of my new favorite place...and a special thanks to Lou, the magnificent man who led us through a maze of wooden pieces pointing out the hidden & spectacular along the way (including an enourmous, probably 15ft tall?, intact balcony ornately framed out in a greening metal with elaborate stained glass dragons embedded in the interior wooden frame! Incredible!)!